By 1963 the Ford Thunderbird had become firmly established as a personal luxury car. The spirit of the original ‘Little Birds’ was reborn with the Mustang. For 1964 the T Bird was redesigned with rather busy sculptured side panels and this basic shape would continue more or less unaltered until 1967. Although 1964 production set a T Bird record at close to 92,500 units, the proportion of customers choosing the open top version continued to fall. After 1966 the open T Bird would be no more.
Three lines were built in 1965. The hardtop coupe found nearly 43,000 homes at $4,500 whilst the Landau hardtop sold nearly 21,000 copies at just under $4,600. Nearly 4,500 Special Edition Landau hardtops were built but the convertible, at nearly $5,000 found only just over 5000 buyers. Thunderbird owners it would seem, were no longer wind-in-the-hair types.

Recommended retail price for this 1/43 scale handbuilt model: £45.80